Christmas Gifts: Homemade Sea Salted Caramels

Thursday, November 13, 2014

 sea, salt, caramel, sweets, food, blog, blogger, uk lifestyle, gift, edible, homemade, christmas

sea, salt, caramel, sweets, food, blog, blogger, uk lifestyle, gift, edible, homemade, christmas

Ahhhh here it is the first "suggestion" for you to put in your homemade Christmas hamper that you totally have time for in the busy run up to Christmas. Can you sense my sarcasm? Every year I have such great ideas for homemade Christmas presents and then time goes too quick and before you know it's a few days before Christmas. But there is no excuse not to make these on a day off (and I hope I can make a lot more recipes too). They are really easy to make and sound really impressive and the best thing about these? They will keep until Christmas. 

To be honest with you I never really jumped on the salted caramel bandwagon when it came around a few years ago. I'm not the biggest fan of sweet and salty together but in these the sea salt is subtle and compliments the sweet caramel really well. I am planning on making these again for people as little presents ( I WILL MAKE TIME!, I hope) and next time I am going to coat them in dark chocolate. We made these on Saturday morning and I am told that by Saturday evening there were none left at my sister in laws. They were definitely a hit.

Scroll down for the recipe.

sea, salt, caramel, sweets, food, blog, blogger, uk lifestyle, gift, edible, homemade, christmas

sea, salt, caramel, sweets, food, blog, blogger, uk lifestyle, gift, edible, homemade, christmas

You will need:

A good candy/sugar/jam thermometer unless you can tell by eye.
Wax paper.

 175ml double cream 
1 tsp vanilla extract 
60g  salted butter 
1½ tsp flaked sea salt 
250g  granulated sugar 
160g golden syrup

Line a square roaster (20cm) with baking paper. 

In a pan heat the cream with the vanilla add half the butter and ½ tsp salt until it gets to boiling point. Take the pan off the heat and leave.

In a medium-sized heavy-based pan heat the sugar and golden syrup, stirring a little to help the sugar melt. 

Once the sugar is almost melted shake the pan gently and irregularly to avoid getting any hot spots. Turn up the heat and cook until the syrup reaches 155°C on a sugar thermometer. 

Take the pan off the heat and add the cream mixture, stirring with a wooden spoon until smooth. Put the pan back on the heat and heat the mixture until it reaches 127°C.

Remove from the heat and stir in the rest of the butter. 

Pour into the prepared tin and leave for 10 minutes. Sprinkle on the extra salt (you may not want to use it all). 

Leave to cool. This does not set hard – it is chewy. 

Cut with a sharp knife, you can heat the knife if you find it won't cut through. 

Wrap in the wax paper to create pretty sweets.

These will keep for a month in an airtight container.


2 Replies

2 comments

  1. These look amazingly good - I'm really scared of making caramel but it looks like a simple method! x

    NINEGRANDSTUDENT: A Student Lifestyle Blog

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you! It's not that bad. It doesn't bubble up to high unlike most sweets. I would definitely give it a go :)

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